of the wood-fire is sweeter than incense.  Venus hangs like a silver lamp in the northwest.  She, too, disappears, but to the east Mars—­it is the time of his opposition—­shines in splendor straight down the old road, seemingly brought very near by the telescopic effect of the dark trees on either side.  Sister stars look down in limpid beauty from a cloudless sky.  All sounds have ceased.  A fortnight hence the air will be vibrant with the calls of the katydids and the grasshoppers, but now the silence is supreme.  It is good for man sometimes to be alone in the silence of the night—­to pass out from the world of little things, temporary affairs, conditional duties, into the larger life of nature.  There may be some feeling of chagrin at the thought how easily man passes out of the world and how readily and quickly he is forgotten; but this is of small moment compared with the sense of self reliance, of sturdy independence, which belongs to the out-of-doors.  By the light of the stars the non-essentials of life are seen in their true proportions.  There are so many things which have only a commercial value, and even that is uncertain.  Why strive for them or worry about them?  In nature there is a noble indifference to everything save the attainment of the ideal.  Flattery aids not an inch to the growth of a tendril, blame does not take one tint from the sky.  In nature is the joy of living, of infinite, eternal life.  Her eternity is now, today, this hour.  Each of her creatures seeks the largest, fullest, best life possible under given conditions.  The wild raspberries on which the catbirds were feeding today would have been just as fine had there been no catbird to eat them or human eye to admire them.  Had there been no human ear to delight, the song of the woodthrush would have been just as sweet.  The choke-cherries crimsoning in the summer sun, the clusters of the nuts swelling among the leaves of the hickory will strive to attain perfection, whether or no there are human hands to gather them.  They live in beauty, simplicity and serenity, all-sufficient in themselves to achieve their ends.

* * * * *

Let me live by the old road among the flowers and the trees, the same old road year after year, yet new with the light of each morning.  Shirking not my share of the world’s work, let me gather comfort from the cool grasses and the restful shade of the old road, hope and courage from the ever-recurring miracle of the morning and the springtime, inspiration to strive nobly toward a high ideal of perfection.  They are talking of improving the old road.  They will build pavements on either side, and a trim park in the middle, where strange shrubs from other states will fight for life with the tall, rank weeds which always tag the heels of civilization.  Then let me live farther out,—­always just beyond the last lamp on the outbound road, like Omar Khayyam in his strip of herbage, where there are no improvements,